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Officials at Ohio State University say the overnight vandalism of a black cultural center on campus is a symptom of the tense national discussion of racism spurred by the killing of a Florida teenager.

Someone spray-painted “Long Live Zimmerman” on a wall of the Frank W. Hale Jr. Black Cultural Center, at 153 W. 12th Ave., after midnight. The words have since been removed.

Officials believe the writing was a reference to George Zimmerman, a neighborhood-watch captain who shot and killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Fla., in February. Martin was unarmed, but Zimmerman has said the shooting was in self-defense.

The shooting sparked a nationwide series of protests and marches saying the shooting was racially motivated and asking for Zimmerman to be arrested. Martin was black.

About 90 people gathered last night on OSU’s campus in a rally to remember the lives of Martin and Shaima Alawadi, an Iraqi refugee living in San Diego who later died after she was found severely beaten in her home last month.

Larry Williamson Jr., the director of the Hale center, which is part of the university’s office of diversity and inclusion, called the vandalism unacceptable.

Williamson said part of the center’s mission is to educate and spark discussion about injustices in the country, but nothing gives someone the right to spray-paint an opinion on the side of a building dedicated to the campus’ black community.

OSU President E. Gordon Gee issued a statement this afternoon condemning the act. "Let me be very clear: This is not who we are at Ohio State. Racism will not be tolerated on our campus,” he wrote. “I want to assure you that our University police are vigorously investigating this incident.”

He said Frank Hale Jr., the building's namesake, understiood that the university must act with an open mind and spirit of inclusion. “Our challenge now, as always, is for each of us to speak out against messages of hatred and injustice,” Gee wrote.